Jazz funerals are at the core of cultural memory of New Orleans residents, yet to most people their origins are a mystery. How did these burial rites become a tradition of such surpassing beauty?

The African rhythms and danced-memory of the enslaved at Congo Square, the intersection of Africans and Indians, the grandeur of European marching bands, the dirges played at the many funerals for yellow fever victims, the melodies of African Americans in the Reconstruction era, the rise of late 19th century Sicilian brass bands, the riffs of jazzmen who played hymns in processions by day and in Storyville cat houses by night—these cultural forces came together in shaping the tradition of "funerals with music."

This film follows protagonist Michael White, prolific bandleader, composer, and professor, on a journey into his past, searching out the story of his musical ancestors and their role in the dawn of jazz. The film spotlights White's trumpeter and sidekick Gregg Stafford, and through vintage scenes of burial parades of yesteryear, and the stories of their mentors, bandleaders Doc Paulin, Milton Batiste and Harold Dejan, we follow the evolution of parades for the dead. As this story unfolds, we meet culture-carriers in the parading tradition of second-liners, the dancers in funeral parades and for Social Aid and Pleasure Clubs.

Our guide here is Deb "Big Red" Cotton, who moved to New Orleans just before Hurricane Katrina and put down roots in the flooded city. The film takes a jarring turn when Deb is wounded in a gang crossfire at a 2013 Mother's Day parade. After dozens of surgeries, she forgives the young men convicted of the crime, visiting her own shooter in prison. Deb Cotton's death in 2017 from lingering wounds shifted the focus of the film. Her funeral is a poignant turning point in the story of a city, like so many, grappling with gun violence.

​The film closes on a powerful upbeat with the musicians playing dirges at the ceremony of Lolis Elie, the pioneering civil rights lawyer whose life encompassed an era of epic social change. As the burial parade rolls on, we see the jazz funerals holding a mirror to the history of the city, transcending the sorrows of those who mourn with the overwhelming beauty of a tradition, embodied by Dr. Michael White in the City of A Million Dreams.